sink and puddle of obscurity and profligacy, became refined and clearer as it flowed on. The goodness of her heart triumphed over the badness of her surroundings. Her last days were the best, and she gave evidence of penitence in a life of humble charity and benevolence.

The home which, it is supposed, saw her wild days of merriment has put on an air of grey and chastened old age.

The original wings are gone; one, comparatively modern, has the complexion of elderly middle age. Never was a dwelling, with all its cupboards, better adapted from attics to cellars, for games of hide-and-seek. The front door opens on a finely panelled hall. It retains the original wainscot, and in the centre is a square well-staircase. Dr. B. E. Martin writes in "Old Chelsea" that this staircase remains the same as when Charles II. rode up it on his pony for a freak. The rooms on each side have window-seats, which show the thickness of the outer wall. As for partitions between the rooms, paper, cracked and torn, displays canvas; canvas, frayed and broken, discloses plaster; taps and thumps produce a hollow sound and reveal hiding-places. During some repairs to the front bedroom in the south side of the house, a secret recess was discovered. This contained what had been once some wooden plates. In the diningroom wall which overlooks the lawn some fragments of pottery were found, and in October 1896, when the brickwork of the chimney stacks called for attention, an old copper coin, completely defaced, was drawn out of its lodging place in the top course of the central blocks.

Still more interesting were the relics discovered during earlier alterations in the house. A so-called Freemason's badge or jewel, said to have belonged to Charles II., lay under the boards of one of the rooms on the first floor. It was given to the engineer of the Gas Company to whom the property has belonged since 1824, and he presented it to his lodge. At the same time as the discovery of this jewel an ancient thimble engraved with initials "N.G." was discovered, and helped to confirm the tradition that Nell Gwynn had made the place her home. If believers

needed still further evidence for conviction, it was afforded by a medallion portrait of her in plaster which, as Faulkner declares, was found upon the estate and was in his time in the possession of William Howard of Walham Green, who

Portrait of Nell Gwynn by G. Kneller, now reproduced from a photograph for the first time

purchased the property in 1788. The walls and floors suggest endless possibilities of hidden treasures. Common pine boards have been worn through by countless steps. A second floor of older, wider and superior planks appears in patches, but probably lies above a third of oak of the

seventeenth century. When there is evidence of something hidden below the surface there is always food for imagination. A presage of tales of mystery merges into conviction when one reaches the cellars. In one, an arch leads to a bricked-up passage, said to be a subterranean way passing under the creek to the premises of Mr. Ormson, horticultural builder, and perhaps penetrating as far as the Royal Hospital, Chelsea. This asylum for deserving veterans clings affectionately to the legend that it owes its existence to Nell Gwynn, who persuaded Charles II. to more than one work of mercy. Perhaps the king used the passage to escape when he was required to attend to affairs of State.

The romance of this old home does not end with the Stuarts. There is no doubt that a country house at Sand's End was the birthplace of the Spectator. Joseph Addison brought out this popular periodical on March 1, 1711, and Swift's "Journal to Stella " contains this entry, "September 15, 1710.-We dined at a country house near Chelsea, where Mr. Addison often retires." Further entries and correspondence together with traditions, give evidence in favour of the belief that Addison's rural retreat was none other than the Manor House. The famous poet and scholar had another pursuit besides literature to occupy him during the time he lived in Sand's End. For at least eight years his stern, handsome face seems to have been steadfastly set to wooing the Countess of Warwick. His patience met its reward when he reached the age of forty-four. How sweetly the nightingales sang for Addison in the quiet groves of Sand's End. How he longed for sympathetic ears to listen with him to their song of tender melancholy. This may be gathered from his letters. He wrote to the young Earl of Warwick and Holland, son of the widowed Countess :

SANDY END, May 20th, 1708.

MY DEAR LORD,-I have employed the whole neighbourhood in looking after birds'-nests, and not altogether without success. My man found one last night, but it proved a hen's with fifteen eggs

in it covered by an old broody duck which may satisfy your Lordship's curiosity a little though I am afraid the eggs will be of little use to us. This morning I have news sent to me of a nest full of little eggs streaked with red and blue veins that by the description they give me must make a very pretty figure on a string. My neighbours are very much divided in opinion upon them; some say they are a skylark's; others will have them to be a canary bird's; but I am much mistaken in the colour and turn of the eggs if they are not full of tom-tits. If your Lordship does not make haste, I am afraid that they will be birds before you see them.

Addison grew still more persuasive and affectionate to the boy whom he sought to make his stepson as the spring days lengthened. A week later he wrote to him:

SANDY END, May 27th, 1708.

MY DEAREST LORD,-I cannot forbear being troublesome to your Lordship while I am in your neighbourhood. The business of this is to invite you to a concert of music which I have found out in a neighbouring wood. It begins precisely at six in the evening and consists of a blackbird, a thrush, a robin red-breast and a bullfinch. There is a lark that by way of overture, sings and mounts till she is almost out of hearing, and afterwards falling down leisurely, drops to the ground as soon as she has ended her song. The whole is concluded by a nightingale that has a much better voice than Mrs. Tofts, and something of the Italian manner in her diversions. If your Lordship will honour me with your company, I will promise to entertain you with much better music and more agreeable scenes, than you ever met with at the opera; and will conclude with a charming description of the nightingale out of our friend, Virgil.

Addison first quotes the Latin, and then gives the translation by Dryden :

So close to poplar shades her children gone

The mother nightingale laments alone;

Whose nest some prying churl had found and thence

By stealth conveyed the unfeathered innocence.

But she supplies the night with mournful strains
And melancholy music fills the plains.

It is to be hoped that the young earl showed his letters to his mother and that the allusion to the bereaved nightingale lamenting alone touched her widowed heart. Something constrained her to take compassion on the solitary man of letters, for they were married in 1716. His affection for the boy with whom he had gone birds'-nesting

stood the test of the new relationship. Few quotations from Addison are more familiar than his parting words to the Earl of Warwick, when he grasped the strong young hand and said, "See how a Christian can die."

But this was in Holland House, which is rich in stories of its own. Before the days when ripe mulberries and birds'-eggs and the song of nightingales enticed Addison's friends to share the simple life at Sandy End; before the present fabric of Sandford House rose above its foundations, the ancient Manor had found a place in History. It was known as Stamford, Stanford, Sampford, or Sandford; like Samuel Weller, it left the spelling of the name to the taste and fancy of the speller. In the days of Edward Longshanks, John de Saundeford held a tenement on the sandy ground between Chelsea and Fulham. How it passed into the hands of Warren de Lisle and became known as "Lord Lisle's Place "; how it descended into the possession of Thomas Lord Berkeley, then of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, and before his death, which took place in 1430, became the property of the Church-all this and much more is told in the Book of the Chronicles. The history is given at length in "Fulham Old and New," by Feret. Dull records are here and there illuminated by suggestive facts. In 1425, for instance, Nicholas Dixon, clerk, was ordered to make his ditch between "Samford Bregge" and a certain "pightell " or small enclosure of the "Comes of Warwick." The ditch outlived this reverend gentleman and his successors who represented the Dean and Chapter of S. Martin's. It is the creek which separates Chelsea from Fulham. History affirms that Henry VIII., with the generosity for which he was famous, granted the collegiate church with all its endowments to the monastery of S. Peter's, Westminster. Alas for the stability of royal gifts! His daughter, Queen Mary, sold the property in 1558 to William Maynard, citizen and mercer of London. Sandford Manor remained in the possession of the Maynard family for many generations, and gathered the traditions which still cling to it and lend it charm.